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Glasgow is a city which has experienced constant change and adaptation, from its period as a great industrial city and as the Second City of Empire, to its latter day reinvention as the City of Culture and the Second City of Shopping. This is a city with pull, buzz, excitement, and a sense of style and its own importance. It has a potent international reach and influence. Glasgow’s story continually weaves in and out of a global urban tapestry: following the trade threads of Empire, there are nearly two dozen towns and cities around the world named after Glasgow—from Jamaica to Montana to Nova Scotia. And there is even a Glasgow on the moon.

Glasgow’s constant proclamation of its present success story is justified on the basis that it benefits the city: confidence will breed confidence, tourists will visit, businesses will relocate and students will enrol. But, despite the gains this approach has brought for Glasgow and cities like it, there are signs that the wind is starting to come out of the sails. What felt radical when Dublin, Barcelona and Glasgow embarked on the city makeover path in the late 1980s and early 1990s, now feels derivative and is delivering diminishing returns. When every city has commissioned a celebrity architect and pedestrianised a cultural quarter, distinctiveness is reduced to a formula.

(a) Explain why, according to the writer, Glasgow was in the past an important world city. (1) U

(b) Explain why Glasgow could be considered important now. (1) U

(c) Show how the writer’s use of language (“This is a city . . . the moon.”) emphasises Glasgow’s importance. (2) A

(d) What does the writer mean by the words “radical” and “derivative” in his discussion of city development? (2) U

(e) Show how the writer’s use of language in the second paragraph suggests his doubts about the alleged “success story” of Glasgow. (4) A

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Read the following article from today’s Herald, answering the questions that follow.

SIXTY luxury apartments at a troubled waterfront development are being sold in bulk for the bargain price of £8 million. The unusual sale comes at one section of a controversial multi-million pound redevelopment of the shoreline stretching from Granton to Leith in Edinburgh. It was claimed the price tag is vastly below the market value. However, high-end estate agents Savills, who are conducting the sale on behalf of the investment company that owns the property, Europa Apartments, insisted yesterday that the flats were being sold at market value.

But one property source said last night the high speculation of such flats would mean prices could range from between £150,000 to £200,000 for a two-bedroom flat and considerably more for a three-bedroom apartment. The flats are currently being rented out and make about £540,000 a year. Gordon Munro, Labour councillor for the area, said last night that while the low-cost sale was another blow for the wider district it could also bring the development within the price range of a social housing buyer.

“It has been disappointing what has happened with the waterfront,” he said. Seven years ago, the £300m masterplan for the area included 3000 apartments and more than 23,000 square metres of commercial and business space created. Cafes, shops and restaurants were also to line a canal passing through the middle of the scheme at that stage. It is not the only such regeneration project to be scaled back after the economic downturn.

In Glasgow, Australian tycoon Rodney Price’s multi-million pound plans to transform the waterfront were scrapped more than two years ago after the developer went bankrupt, with a further proposal also folding because of the recession.

1. How does the author use word choice to convey what type of estate agent Savills are? A (2)

2. What is Gordon Munro’s opinion about the sale of these flats? U (2)

3. How does the writer’s language in paragraph 3 convey the initial expectations for this project? A (4)

4. How does the author make clear the context of the word “folding,” in the final paragraph? U (2)

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Context questions – find the meaning of a word or a phrase from the context of that word (the other words around it.) You must quote these other words and define the original word

Link Questions – go to the part of the passage as directed. Find a bit before that links to this and quote it. Then, find a bit that follows it that links to it and quote it. Also, quote any link words, such as “additionally,” “yet,” “despite this,” etc.